Gemm's Dyslexia Treatment

Dyslexia in children is best described as an unexpected difficulty reading. Signs of dyslexia include a choppy reading style, skipping or guessing while reading, difficulty with reading comprehension, spelling issues or a lack of reading stamina.
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Dyslexia can be an overwhelming diagnosis, but it need not be a life sentence. The underlying skill gaps required for fluent reading with comprehension can in most case be corrected. The brain has much more in common with a muscle than a hard-wired computer -- it can learn new skills. Our dyslexia treatment can help improve reading efficiency at any age.

How We Help Dyslexia

Dyslexics switch |b| and |d| because they hear them the same. Gemm uses Fast ForWord software, a program that improves how the brain processes language. By "cleaning up" how students hear language, words on a page are more recognizable and so decoding is more natural. This helps comprehension and overall reading enjoyment. Our students primarily work on our software at home with Gemm professional oversight and direction.

How It Works

Fast ForWord helps the brain hear each sound inside a word, called a phoneme. This helps the brain accurately map the language for reading -- "sneaker" is heard and stored as sn-ea-k-er not as n-ea-ga and so it is recognized when seen as text. This makes decoding far less exhausting and a lot more fluent. We also strengthen the working memory skills required to retain what is read.

The program isolates and strengthens these fundamental cognitive skills using adaptive exercises that build speed and complexity in tiny, incremental steps.
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Once a cognitive foundation is in place, Gemm's individualized protocol aims to helps students routinely think while reading. Part of this entails rebuilding a student's reading mechanics, eradicating bad habits like skipping words and improving the fundamentals of spelling, language structure and vocabulary as needed. As important though are the missing word and categorization exercises that help the student develop analytical skills while reading, the essential skill required for reading comprehension.

Our ultimate goal is reading with metacognition.  This is the ability to read and think about what you are reading and self-correct as you go. This critical skills cannot even begin to develop until reading is automatic.
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Most Common Cause of Dyslexia

Dyslexia problems most often stem from difficulty processing sound, called an auditory processing disorder or CAPD. This is sometimes evident in early language skills, but just as often it is not.  Hearing "cat" as one sound for spoken language is much easier than hearing it as three sounds |c|-|a|-|t| as is required for the brain to map that word so that it can be recognized when reading.

If a child cannot clearly process phonemes reading is going to be a challenge.   In later grades, this difficulty morphs into an inefficient reading style that is exhausting and diverts brain capacity needed for reading comprehension.
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